


wind has burned your skin

by jessamurphy



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mentions of Maya, Post-Episode: s03e04 Watch the Thrones, jonty, mention of kane, mentions of Finn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 21:41:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6094948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jessamurphy/pseuds/jessamurphy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Jasper thought that, by now, he was used to being a sobbing mess. Still, every time, he managed to be surprised by the sudden rush of emotions, the pounding of his heart in his throat, the shaking he could not seem to control. It started at the tips of his fingers, it always did. Thousands of tiny needles prickled his skin from within, rallying their way up and down his body, spreading in his face and blurring his sight, though the latter might as well have been the work of the hot tears staining his cheeks. With numb fingers he clawed at the earth, trying to gather whatever was left of the mess he’d made.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Set after 3x04: Watch The Thrones.<br/>Monty knows he should probably let Jasper go, but he isn't ready for that just yet. Meanwhile, Jasper struggles to keep his head up and not drown in his own sorrow. Radical changes are made, and everything might take a turn for the better.</p><p>Or:<br/>"He died that day too"<br/>What if Monty decides that, if he can't have his best FRIEND back, he'll at least get Jasper back?</p>
            </blockquote>





	wind has burned your skin

**Author's Note:**

> _Wind has burned your skin_  
>  _The lovely air so thin_  
>  _The salty water's underneath your feet_  
>  _No one's gone in vain_  
>  _Here is where you'll stay_  
>  _This life has been insane but_  
>  _Today has been ok_  
>     
> Title taken from 'today has been ok' by sleeping at last.  
> This fic is completely unbeta'd, so if there are any spelling mistakes or grammatical errors feel free to point them out to me!  
> I hope you enjoy!

„Either you pull yourself together and get on with your life or you fall apart alone,” the words were hitting the ground, tumbling out of his mouth. Monty never meant it to happen, never thought it would happen, but he watched it with hazy eyes in slow-motion.  
„Are you done?”  
He’d never expected the reaction he got. It took him all he had to swallow the lump in his throat, to not let the tears filling his eyes spill. A moment, a careful breath, a heartbeat.  
„I miss my best friend,” it was the biggest truth he could’ve told. If anger didn’t work, maybe honesty would. And God, he was so tired of keeping it inside. The months that had crept by, time crawling with claws lashing sharp at tender skin, ever suffocating, never silencing the voices in his head. After all, he had caused it, it was his fault. But at the back of his mind there was always a tug, a voice of reason telling him that he had reason to do it. A reason to play God and destroy it all.  
And the reason was standing in front of him, spitting out words.  
„He died that day, too.”  
All Monty could do in that moment was give one small nod and walk away, blinded by the big nothingness of feeling too much. If he’d stay any longer, he might implode. Jasper had been clear.

Jasper thought that, by now, he was used to being a sobbing mess. Still, every time, he managed to be surprised by the sudden rush of emotions, the pounding of his heart in his throat, the shaking he could not seem to control. It started at the tips of his fingers, it always did. Thousands of tiny needles prickled his skin from within, rallying their way up and down his body, spreading in his face and blurring his sight, though the latter might as well have been the work of the hot tears staining his cheeks. With numb fingers he clawed at the earth, trying to gather whatever was left of the mess he’d made. He looked up without really wanting to, quickly smothering the small flicker of hope he fear he might have felt at the thought of Monty possibly still being there.  
„No,” he muttered, voice hoarse. He kept digging with his hands, trying to salvage yet another person he couldn’t save. He couldn’t stop the shaking, he couldn’t stop the movement of his limbs. „No, no, no,” he muttered again and again and again, staccato and ragged like his breaths. He wept, crying out with every word he couldn’t speak, every thought he couldn’t smother no matter what amount of alcohol was pumping through his veins. His heart felt heavy with loss, a feeling so familiar he wondered whether and when it would indulge him. Every fiber in him screamed. It would consume him, and he would let it.  
Last time Jasper had woken up, Monty had been there, a sight so familiar yet so strange. When his pounding head thought back he saw Monty smiling, standing at his bed, year after year. At the Ark, in the skybox, on the ground. Monty aged tragically, memories slipping away in the haze of his waking. Staring at the open sky he still felt the press of Monty’s hand against his, still saw the gleam of hope in his eyes when he had woken that day after days of unconsciousness after getting speared by grounders. He still felt the heavy weight of the sword in his hands, saw the look on the face threatened by it, felt the words curling around his lips. He still felt the heavy weight of his best friend’s body against his, arms thinner than they had ever been, their shared embrace so tight that neither had dared to breathe. The relief to find Monty alive. The grief to see Maya die.  
His arms burned like they had been lit on fire, the memory of her etched into his unknowing skin. Jasper crawled in his own skin, turning away from the open sky and towards the trees. He couldn’t stomach his fear any longer, resting a hand upon the soil. He swallowed the bitter taste, dry heaved upon the earth till he pulled himself long enough to return to camp. His future waited in his backpack, promising to numb the pain. When he closed his eyes his mind flashed images of a past he could no longer live in. He unscrewed the cap of a bottle, sending a shiver down his spine. He let his back hit the metal wall. While the alcohol hit his tongue he closed his eyes to swallow. He didn’t drink to numb the grief of Maya’s death, he knew. He drunk to forget his best friend. 

When the evening came to lower his eyelids, the smell of alcohol in his nostrils didn’t drown out the smell of blood on Jasper’s hands. The bitter taste on his tongue did not erase the words he had said. The alcohol itself, did in fact, not wipe his mind clean of any leftover disaster clinging in the crooks of his brain. His body didn’t want to move the way he wanted it to, head lolling from side to side while everything was just too slow and too fast. He’d hit the bottom of the same vicious pit again and again, displaying the same images and the same voices. It was only the words that changed. Tonight it was only one fragment, one piece of conversation stuck in his head like a broken record.  
„I’m not fine!” Vicious the words came from him. Jasper wrapped his hands around his head, feeling nothing but stubble where his longer locks once had been. Between fluttering eyelids he remembered tender hands taking his, moving them away from his scalp. Soft, sad words muttered agains his ear, brown eyes looking at him in honesty.  
„Jasp,” the boy had uttered, kneeling in front of him. „Jasp, stop pulling your hair.”  
His hair was a tangled mess, his fingers stuck, nails digging in his scalp to numb the pain. He shook his head. He couldn’t stop pulling, he needed the distraction. If he didn’t distract himself, his mind would wander back to both his heaven and hell, vividly pounding inside his skull.  
„Jasper, look at me,” the voice had sounded urgent. His hands were taken away from his scalp, the warmth around them one he recognized from touches scattered between years and years of familiarity. Jasper let out a choked sob and shook his head again. He couldn’t, knowing to whom the voice belonged. Between drooping eyelids and the pounding in his head he heard the movement of metal near his scalp.  
„He’s bleeding,” Abby’s cool voice said. Monty had retorted: „I know,” because he had seen how Jasper had kept hitting his head ferociously agains the wall, inflicting the pain upon himself. He had seen how his best friends for years had started pulling his hair, tugging it ever so hard, until the tears had welled up in his eyes and his body couldn’t take it anymore.  
„We- he needs it gone,” Monty had said resolutely, voice strained, eyes visibly wet. „His hair. I- I can’t let him- not anymore.”  
" _I’m not fine_!” the voice in Jasper’s head screamed again, and he let himself curl into a ball on the ground. „ _I’m not fine! I’m not fine! I’m not fine! Just because I’m not drinking myself into a stupor every night- I’m not fine._ ” Alcohol didn’t stop the angry scratches down his neck. Alcohol didn’t stop the lurching pit inside him swallowing Jasper whole. Alcohol didn’t stop the truth from seeping through every crack of his drunken demeanor. „ _Just because I’m not drinking myself into a stupor every night doesn’t mean I’m not screwed up!_ ”  
  
A thud woke Monty out of his slumber a few days later. He hadn’t been asleep, anyway, hadn’t been for months. Some nights were better than the others, but this wasn’t one of them. He sought for the source in the dark, noticing the dim rays of sunlight creeping through the cracks.  
„Abby!” he screamed as soon as his eyes had found the origin of the sound. Shaking on the ground was Jasper’s body, twitching uncontrollably. Without a doubt Monty rushed towards him, sliding on his knees, cupping Jasper’s face with his hands. „Abby!” he called out again, waking with no doubt half of the other Arkers. Under his fingers Jasper was burning up, skin damp, brow peppered with beads of sweat. He counted the heartbeats it took the medic to arrive at the scene, counted his own, counted Jasper’s. Inside his chest his heart was beating almost as irregular as the other boy’s, tight with an overwhelming fear he’d only felt twice before: the day Jasper got speared and the day the lever was pulled at Mount Weather. The distinct feeling of being useless overtook him, leaving the trembling body in the hands of the doctor, letting her do what he couldn’t do.  
„Do you know what happened?” Abby asked, nursing the body. Monty shook his head, eyes stuck at the sliver of Jasper’s neck exposed, the scar left by the knife of assumed enemies. Abby continued to inspect Jasper, while Monty saw his lips move. He opened his mouth to warn Abby, but Jasper was the first to speak, voice creaking.  
„Make it stop,” he pleaded, wheezing and shivering. „Please,” his voice cracked, „make it- make it stop. I just need it to go away. I just need it- I- I just need-”  
„Shh,” Abby shushed the young boy in her arms. „Shh. We’ll make it stop, Jasper.” She looked at Monty. „We’ll make it stop.”

  
For a moment, Jasper saw Monty pacing the room. He pretended to be asleep, while he really wasn’t. The dreams hadn’t gone away, even though the taste of alcohol accompanying them had. Slowly but surely he felt like he was reclaiming his own mind. The first night had been the hardest, deciding altogether to just stop. His body hadn’t taken it, but that had been it, he had told himself. Still he was taunted with every memory he had tried to forget, still voices struck his mind. The feeling of weight pressing against his body never left him, and the last breaths making the hair on his back stand up did neither. He still couldn’t sleep when he closed his eyes, still woke up bathing in sweat, still couldn’t look anyone straight into the eye. Mount Weather had blown up, taking at least half of surviving farm station down with the explosion. Jasper had feel shaken by the news, giving up his persisting anger towards the Arkers, knowing that it could’ve been Monty’s parents in there. Monty’s parents, who were like a second family to him, whom he had known through the years up in the sky. Monty’s parents, who were only half alive, or so he’d heard. Monty had found his mother, but had lost his father. A bitter price to pay, but at the end of the day he had someone to lean on, while Jasper had wound up alone.  
Jasper couldn’t be angry, though. His anger had burned up some time ago, when he kept beating himself up over the poison he’d spit over Finn’s scattered remains. „ _I’m not fine_ ,” Monty had told him, and it had been true for both of them.  
The weight of his conscious pressed heavy against his chest, slowing his breath. When he opened his eyes again, Monty was gone. Maybe he hadn’t even been there, which nowadays seemed the more probable option to him. Hallucinations had visited him that first night, drawing his skin and sucking the blood away from his brain. It had been a trick of mind, he told himself. After all, why would one visit someone who had treated him so poorly?  
  
If time healed all wounds, it was now making Monty want to scratch the scabs it had formed. He had told himself to give up, to walk away and not look back. He told himself he could do it, that he should do it. But whenever he tried he got this gnawing feeling, a past he couldn’t let go of, the rush of fear and imbalance and the sense that it was wrong and nothing was right. Proving himself now would help neither of the halves that once formed an unbreakable pair.  
Monty wasn’t ready to loose his best friend just yet.  
Abby signaled him, spotting him from the doorframe leading to the hospital wing. Monty froze, only then realizing where he was. A sad smile graced Abby’s face, giving a small nod. Monty approached the former councilor, every step heavy with guilt and worry.  
„He’s getting better,” she said, and he could tell by her face that she wasn’t lying. He let out a sigh of relief. „He still has a long way to go.”  
„So do we,” answered Monty, looking past the older woman. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the sadness in her eyes, the wrinkles around her mouth more prominent.  
„You may enter,” said Abby, gesturing inside. It took Monty a moment to decide. He wasn’t ready to lose his best friend, yet, but inside his head, Jasper’s voice echoed with the words spoken the night of their fight. His best friend may have died in Mount Weather, but he could at least try to revive his friend. A friend. That would be enough. Jasper would always be enough.

„Hey,” he heard softly, as if the words were a ghost of what they were supposed to be. Next to his bed he saw a streak of black hair, unsure brown eyes. Jasper’s heart sped up, skipping a beat. For a blissful moment he was back in their tent, waking up to the well-known voice readying him for another day on the ground, before the truth came crashing into him like a comet. The spear, the blood, the cages, the girl and the marks, the people falling at their feet, the taste of cake mixed with the sour taste of bile, the yelling and the screaming and the yelling and the anger, the vicious anger he had never bitten back, the piercing words and the tasteless numbing alcohol, the sound of metal near his scalp, his hands being clasped ever so tight, the scattered remains and the gut feeling that never left him. They had destroyed them. They had taken what they could and then they had wiped out an entire civilization.  
A ragged breath escaped his lips as he was unsure how to deal with his emotions, with this pain.  
He could’ve saved them all.  
Except he really couldn’t have.  
For the past few days his sober mind gone over it repeatedly. Cold calculation. Had he killed the leader of the Mountain Men- it wouldn’t have worked. His heart had sunk at the realization, instinctively knowing the wrong he had done, the grief he had caused. He hadn’t stopped shaking, hadn’t stopped until his tears ran dry and he couldn’t control his breathing anymore. Abby had rushed to him, holding him tight, muttering the same words over and over again until they were stuck on repeat in his head.  
„Hey,” Jasper managed to choke out. He saw Monty moving, lifting his head, thunderstruck. Jasper still saw the bodies on his retina, tried to push that image aside as he watched the hunched boy closely. His next move, however, caught him completely by surprise.  
„My name is Monty,” other boy said, sticking out his hand. It took a minute for Jasper’s brain to catch up, to understand what Monty was doing. Monty was mending what remainders there were of their former friendship. Incredulous he looked him in the eye, shifting slightly. He then raised his hand and latched onto Monty’s.  
„I’m Jasper,” he said, voice shaky. His hands burned with a silent fire, but for the first time it didn’t feel like it was made to destroy him. „Or at least, I used to be.”

It was a slow start, but it was a start. Abby released Jasper from her care. Jasper knew that he would be back in the future, finding that talking about his problems was preferable to drinking them away. It wasn't easy, but he was getting there. He met up with Lincoln to train, to set up a schedule, while Monty continued doing the jobs he was assigned to do. Slowly but surely Jasper enrolled in the life in Arkadia. At times he found himself sitting next to Monty, silently listening to the others converse. When it came to ear that Raven was being benched so her leg could heal, he decided to pay her a visit.   
„Looks like you need a chemist,” he said, head quirking aside. Raven turned, not expecting her guest. She stood up, far too quick, but ignored her pain in favor of almost crushing Jasper’s ribs. Her eyes shone when she looked at Jasper, smile tugging at her lips.  
„No I don’t,” she said, sitting down again. „I’m not making ammo. I’m sorting scrap metal.”  
„Well, the fates are smiling upon you, my friend,” Jasper said, voice strained and tainted with sadness while repeating words of a conversation passed. „ ‚My kingdom for a soda can,’ that’s what my father used to say.”

At the end of the day Jasper moved what little possessions he had left around. His backpack, the ipod, his earbuds. The urn had long since returned, slightly lighter in weight, and the empty bottles once filling his backpack now functioned as water bottles or something more fleeting like vases. Abby had needed one when Kane had brought her flowers, anyway. Jasper didn’t tell her they were Poison Sumac.  
He looked up when he heard the door sliding open, eyes prying from under his eyebrows. His hair had started to grow back, restlessly, but it still wasn’t the length it had been. That might take a while, he figured, just like the strengthening of his bond with Monty. But it didn’t matter. He got the time.  
„Hey,” he said, voice even with a hint of something one could interpret as resignation. He followed the other boy around the room with his eyes. „Mind if we share?”  
The other boy let out a surprised sound, then nodded slowly, unsure.  
„I need a place to sleep,” Jasper explained. At those words, eyebrows furrowed, then the aghast expression brashly changed to gratification as the words quickly dawned in. Monty didn’t waste another moment and walked up to his friend, stretching out his hand.  
„If we are going to be roommates,” he said formally, „I should probably introduce myself. My name is Monty.”  
This time, Jasper grinned when he took his hand, the flash of the smile brief and uncertain. „I’m Jasper. I believe we’ve met before.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading through all of this! If you enjoyed it or generally want to say something about it, feel free to leave a comment! This is the first fic I've written in five years, so I'm a bit rusty. I apologize for anything being OOC.


End file.
